The Sims 3: Ambitions Updated Q&A - Heroic Careers

Get the details on new heroic career paths in the next expansion for The Sims 3.

The Sims 3 improved on just about everything that the series has to offer when it comes to controlling the lives, the hopes, and the dreams of little computer people. The next expansion, Ambitions, will focus on in-depth career paths that you can play through right along with your sims. Along with the creative career paths we covered in our previous interview, the expansion will offer three new "heroic" professions--firefighter, private investigator, and an expanded version of the doctor from The Sims 3. Associate producer Grant Rodiek explains.

Of all the joints in SimCity to come into and start talking gibberish, she had to walk into mine.

GS: Give us an update on the game's development. What part of the game is the team working on now?

GR: At this point in development, we're focused on polishing all the loose ends. Do careers feel exciting at the right times? Are the rewards fantastic? Can players do everything we want them to be able to do? It's really satisfying to finally see all the pieces lock into place. We're so close!

GS: We understand that in addition to the creative career tracks we covered previously, Ambitions will offer additional "heroic" career paths, such as medicine, firefighting, and private investigation. Give us an overview of these careers. Why were these particular paths chosen?

GR: Fire has been one of the most consistent menaces dating back to even the original The Sims. We wanted to take something that's been so ordinary for so long and make it epic, a little challenging, and really chaotic. Firefighting was one of the first careers we designed. We had a lot of fun crafting more story-driven adventures in The Sims 3: World Adventures, so we wanted to take it a step further. Private investigation seemed like a natural fit for our "Sims noir" style, and our open world was perfect for Sim-styled mayhem.

We love doctors (such great fiction to be had!), and we were pretty happy with the ones from The Sims 3. We saw this as a great foundation for The Sims 3: Ambitions.

GS: How does the medical career go beyond the options in the original game?

GR: Doctors in Ambitions can exit the hospital to save lives during emergencies (such as a woman choking at the bistro), provide free health clinics and inoculations in the community, or provide experimental medicines to the community. Not everything is entirely ethical, but who are we to tell players that?

GS: Tell us about the challenges that firefighters in The Sims 3 will face. Are there new disasters from which they must rescue their neighbors?

GR: Of course! Firefighter sims will encounter small fires (that often escalate if you aren't careful), huge infernos that require dramatic rescues and smooth hose operation, or even earthquakes. Firefighters face two challenges--preparing for emergencies by training and maintaining equipment, and handling them when they occur with speed. Players are required to make quick decisions (do they save the sim or smash the chair before the fire spreads?) to earn high scores and save lives.

GS: What exactly goes into being a private investigator? Going through other people's mail and trash? Taking incriminating photos?

GR: You're going in the right direction! There's the less-honorable side of things, such as going through a suspect's mail or trash. However, private investigators can also conduct stakeouts, assist the police, snoop for clues with their trusty magnifying glass, or dust for prints. There's also blackmail, bribery, fisticuffs, and a handy lockpicking kit for other case-related issues.

GS: What are some of the new traits that help support these new professions?

GR: The best private investigators have the "perceptive" trait. They see things others might miss and generally rise more quickly through the ranks.

Favorites from The Sims 3, like "athletic," "brave," and "daredevil," are perfect for firefighters!

GS: Tell us about the new lifetime rewards that can be earned for players who choose these career paths.

GR: We have a new lifetime wish for players who want their firefighter sims to truly be the best. These sims need to save a large number of sims from death in a fire, which means a lot of emergencies and smart decisions.

We also have a lifetime wish for private investigators who solve a lot of cases. This won’t be easy--there are lots of sims in the neighborhood with many cases to solve!

This won't hurt a bit, except for the part where I poke a giant needle into your shoulder.

Once you fulfill these wishes (as well as the smaller wishes we have to support these features), you can purchase new lifetime rewards. One of these is to permanently fireproof your home so you never need to worry about fire again. Another is a cash booster so that you earn money for every job included. This means you can really rake in the dough as a private investigator.

GS: Finally, is there anything else you'd like to add about these careers, or about Ambitions in general?

GR: We're really delighted that careers like firefighter, private investigator, and doctor provide such unique gameplay moments compared to the creative ones. I love snooping through the neighborhood as a private investigator to spy on people, break into homes, and occasionally solve cases. It's such a different Sims experience.

meh, it doesn't seem like there's enough in this expansion for £20. Im hoping they will add the new stuff from the console version, like the karma powers and the weather. otherwise they're just making one thing that people have been asking for since the original sims.
what im worried about is will things start randomly catching fire, and will sims start dying all the time just make more work?

The choices he mentions, like whether to save the sim or smash the chair, sound just like the boxes that used to appear while Sims were at work. Is this really going to be open-ended and challenging, or will we just click an option and watch it happen?

soooo excited for this expansion! I hope there are multiple new personality traits to complement the different professions/ambitions! World Adventures was fun the first play through, but then once you completed all of the quests, the replay value was nilch. There were some cool additional traits and the photography skill = AWESOME and FUN!! I hope they do Sims 3 pets next, only they should include more unique/adventurous pets than in the previous Sims pets-like chimps or tigers (only if they do chimps they should refrain from allowing it to tear ppls faces off....). Love the Sims series in general, and I'm guessing i will love this expansion as well.

I like that there is a game expansion that actually expands the game instead of a bunch of furniture, clothes and s(beep)t. But the guys who have mentioned that EA needs to address the bug situation are right. It's easy for those of us who have not suffered these problems to scoff, and blame the complainant's machine rather that the product, but with THIS game company... what is it that EA likes to say so much? Oh yes, "It's in the game".
Everybody should be able to buy a product that runs smoothly, period, and not have to jump through a bunch of hoops, or go through a whole song and dance with EA to get it to run properly, and it happens far to often for it to just be an individual's machine or OS.
When this title comes out. I am going to wait a good while before I buy it, if I do, so if there are bugs that need patching I don't have to go through hell, which is something EA seems to really enjoy doing to their customers.

OK i think this was is gonna be rlly good i always wanted to control there jobs or at school and im rlly excited i also liked world adventures but what about PETS i mean to make it even more like real life i think they shud put pets and wheather and make something cool like that idk i think those shud be the next expansions

ya know, the was the only thing i could do with the sims 1, was go online, download user made objects, such as Buyable fire, and the phone that calls random super heroes to your house, and then trap the superheros, and torchure them, until they A: die... or B Deny me my fun and teleport away... :D... i once set up a penal colony, and torchured everyone, and sometimes filled the room with fire, to see who would be left! (btw the room would be closed off, so that the firefighter couldnt get in... :D)

Some are nice ideas, but overall don't like the idea of having to control Sims while they are at work. Had that in Open for Business. In large families this will be very hard to use. The rabit holes were a great idea.
No idea why people are talking about crashing, I play for many hours stright with no crashes or save problems. After the current patches it's very stable.

What Adema83 said.
Maybe they should fix the game first? So that I can play 2 hours without the game crashing to desktop. Or suddenly I cant save and then it crashes before I can do the ; edit - save , "fix".
I do not even dare to travel to any of the holiday sites because over there the game crashes all the time for no obvious reasons.
Ive looked through the forums and hundreds are having the same problems, but EA arent doing anything at all to fix it.

Fact: Before the first SIMS was released, the creator wanted to call the name DOLLHOUSE...because that is what the game is. It's a giant Dollhouse. Marketing would not allow the game to be called DOLLHOUSE and instead changed the name to THE SIMS in order not to scare away most males.

Am I reading this wrong? An expansion on just three of the careers for $37?! The entire game was only a bit more than that.
Ala-carte done piranha style.
How about expanding the game itself instead of just little pieces of it? Things that *everyone* can use would be great.

this seems that its going to be really gud but there are some things i want like a university expansion and maybe open for business and even weather something good from the sims 2 that was really gud dats wat sims 3 needs